Epilogue
by Nightfall169
Summary: Life after the Ceremonial Duel wasn't as rosy as they'd expected. A collection of Yugi's short reflections on living, coping, and his friends. Warning: character death. Implications of Yugi/Yami and Ryou/Bakura.


**A/N**: I woke up with the first few lines of this fic. First Yu-gi-oh fic, so be gentle.

I haven't seen anything past the Doma arc, so some details may be off.

Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-gi-oh.

* * *

**Epilogue**

It was barely two weeks and he was already going through old photos, like an aging parent reminiscing over the good ol' days. He noticed how many of them showed him staring into space, or looking over his shoulder, talking to someone the camera couldn't see. In most of them he looked happy.

He was glad that none of his friends got the idea to take a picture during one of their duels. That look of steely determination would have looked alien on his own face.

He realised that there was little evidence, so little evidence, that Atem ever existed. Just the puzzle, and the memories of those that knew him. No videos. No photos. No records. To the rest of the world, it was Yugi Motou all along. Nothing changed for them the day Atem stepped into the afterlife.

These pictures weren't even old. But it felt like a lifetime ago.

* * *

He used to think that he was the worst off of the three of them.

Malik was better off, of course, since the loss of his yami meant control of his life, his mind, his body. Control that he should have never had to share in the first place. Destiny did not give him his yami. It was his father, after all.

But even there, where everything should have been so simple, so clean, things got...complicated. Malik was glad to be rid of his yami, but he needed to forget. To get away for a while. So he simply left home one day, taking off on his motorcycle, leaving Ishizu to wonder if he would be okay.

He came back 6 months later.

Ryou, Ryou was worse. Sometimes he forgot how young Ryou was when he got the Ring; he never got a chance to really grow up, not like any normal kid. With Bakura gone, Ryou not only lost one of the few stable things in his life, he lost the closest thing he had to family. Needless to say, he did not take Bakura's loss well. He was happy at first and spent most of his time with the rest of them, but soon became more withdrawn. His expression would usually look blank when he thought no one was looking. Yugi confronted him once. The only thing Ryou managed to say was

"I...I just miss him. I know it's wrong...that I shouldn't feel that way. If he came back...for you guys it would be..." There were only tears after that.

After that, Ryou was friendly in school, but rarely joined them to hang out.

* * *

Things refused to stay the same after graduation. Tristan went to college to study political science. Joey became a professional duelist. Tea made the trip to New York to go to dance school. Malik decided to work with Ishizu, snapping up antiquities from the black market before they could be sold outside of the country to private collectors.

Yugi helped Kaiba set up the Duel Academy. He even gave lectures there every once in a while. Those were hugely popular. But mostly, he ran the Game Shop. Grandpa's health wasn't the best anymore.

Ryou opened a tabletop game store. It was small, but after Mokuba pitched Seto the idea to replace RPG figurines with chips that would project holograms, tabletop RPGs became very popular and the store did well.

* * *

Yugi moved on, in a way, but only so much. Most days he got on well enough. Taking care of the store, giving dueling lessons, talking Joey down when he got too worked up – it all occupied him enough not to dwell on the past. He enjoyed not having to worry for the lives of his friends.

Some days, though, when business was slow and Joey wasn't around, Yugi was left to mull over his life. It surprised him that everything turned out so...mundanely. To be sure, he life was still extraordinary by normal standards, but 'extraordinary' feels different when you used to be 'supernatural'.

* * *

Tea came back a little different after 4 years. Most of the time she seemed just as upbeat and cheerful as they remembered, but occasionally she'd stop and stare off into space. Her eyes reminded him of Kaiba's then, and that was enough reason not to pry.

They'd gotten married two years later, not so much out of love, but out of friendship and duty. It felt natural, like something they had to do. For Tea, he was comfortable, safe. For Yugi, she was his first protector, before he solved the Puzzle. She moved in with the Motous right after the wedding.

* * *

He forgot what prompted him to buy a little Osiris statue, but he found it in his closet one day and immediately had the urge to set up a shrine. He grabbed two candles, an old incense holder and some incense from Grandpa's collection. He hid it in the guest room closet behind tattered boxes backgammon and Go. So Tea wouldn't see it. He didn't want her to know how much he secretly held on to his memories.

He intended to only visit it on the anniversary of Atem's death, just to remember him (he'd read that the Egyptians believed that the dead disappeared from the afterlife if they were forgotten). But he ended up visiting it at random times, whenever memories overwhelmed him. But only during the day, when Tea was away teaching at her dance school.

* * *

It took a lot of effort to turn the guest room into a nursery. He'd cleaned it out, moved his little secret to a cupboard in the basement, gave some of the old games away, and painted the walls yellow. Yellow was a happy colour. He wanted their child to be happy, above all else. Joey and Duke came to pitch in too, and to congratulate him. Even Tristan made it; he was an important member of the city's General Assembly now, and it made Yugi happy that he still cared enough to take time out of his schedule to visit.

God, how Tea wanted this child! And now that it was finally coming, she was caught up in all the preparation. He was glad she was happy too.

* * *

People still asked him for autographs sometimes. Just out on the street, randomly. Sometimes it was even a kid.

He was surprised. He'd thought the legend would die down, especially since the title wasn't even functional anymore.

Occasionally, he'd get an email challenging him to a duel. He learned to stop being suspicious of them. No one was out for his life or his soul now. So he always accepted. He won, of course, but it wasn't the same.

There were no stakes anymore.

* * *

He arranged his shrine out on the windowsill. Tea came in just in time.

"Oh Yugi..." she sighed. She suspected something was going on behind her back, but seeing it made it unavoidable.

"Ishizu called. Malik's gone. They found him in an alley. His motorcycle's disappeared too." he lit a candle. He'd asked Ishizu if it was possible it was just a thief. She didn't seem to buy it. Malik was good at dealing with black market traders, but that didn't mean he didn't make enemies.

Tea froze in shock.

"The least I can do is remember him." he lit the second candle

She walked up to the shrine and closed her eyes. Incense wafted around them both. He decided not to tell her how Malik had been shot over a dozen times, or that though the shots were fired at point-blank range, all of the bullets stopped just short of tearing through his back.

He was only 38.

* * *

He was glad he'd taken it upon himself to talk to the teachers. He wasn't going to let his child get bullied. He knew the effects. He knew the signs. He didn't need to be told. He went to the school on his own. The teacher was reluctant to admit that it happens, but he'd stared her down and she agreed to talk to the children.

Tea was proud.

She'd taken the same approach in her school. No bullying tolerated at all. Not even dancers who weren't as good. Especially not dancers who looked a little different. Her school was practically famous in town for it and not everyone approved. But it was worth it to see some of her awkwardest students make it to the stage.

* * *

Ryou was next.

Yugi was always a little worried that Ryou would try to 'go on his own terms' as it were, but it seemed that was not what fate had in store. He was relatively happy, even living mostly alone. His shop was very successful by that time, as card games became widely believed to be a rather dangerous activity, reserved to those who are specifically called to it.

A driver too high to even notice he ran over a person cut Ryou's success short though. Some sort of new drug, too. Tristan was furious.

He laid in the hospital for almost a week, with multiple broken bones and internal bleeding, among other things. He should have been in crippling pain, but a combination of pain killer and inner peace left his face looking almost serene, even as the rest of his body was failing him. Yugi, Tea and Joey stayed by his side until the very end. He couldn't speak, but Yugi had a feeling that Ryou was almost glad to go. To be freed from the burden of trying to keep up appearances. To no longer have to pretend that everything was okay. That everything was fine.

He was 44. Yugi could swear he heard Bakura's smug chuckle dance in the air when the line went flat.

* * *

He'd lived a good life. He'd saved the world multiple times. He'd raised a child. He'd taught kids the art of dueling and kept his friendships and remembered all those who had gone over the years.

He regretted nothing in the end. He wouldn't have changed a thing. This was good. This was how it was meant to be.

He was home now, in bed. Tea sat next to him, simply staring, thin glasses pushed up on her nose, greying hair cut short so it was out of the way. She aged better than he did. She placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Thank you. For everything. For being there for me. For everyone."

He turned his head and smiled at her. He best friend through all these years.

"Welcome."

"We did well for ourselves, don't you think?"

"I think we did."

She supposed it was his time.

He was 57.

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He could have been floating or flying or anything else, but he couldn't be sure because he felt nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing, smelled nothing. He thought nothing too, or at least he couldn't bring himself to think anything coherent.

First came touch. He felt something warm wrapped around him.

Second came vision. All he could see at first was sunlight.

Third came hearing.

"It's good to see you again, aibou."


End file.
